The Front Door – The Plan and Cold Feet

Chronicling my adventures restoring and updating a quirky old Philadelphia rowhouse

The Front Door – The Plan and Cold Feet

I’m hoping to start facade restoration next year as soon as there’s no risk of frost. In the meantime, I need to take my front door off and refinish it while the awnings are still up. I will be locking the house with an old fashioned skeleton key in the vestibule door in the meantime. Can you see how bad the varnish stain is right now?

IMG_9040

But this gets me to something I’ve been ignoring. I get a lot of compliments on this door, some of them from people I care deeply about. And this style of door is all over the place. But I look at it and think, “meh.” So anyways, if you strongly disagree with me here, please call me crazy since that crazy sounds better than a huge snob.

This is not how I react to old doors. In case you need a reminder, I said that the day I found a matched set of 5 doors that were pretty much period correct was the happiest in my life.

little-volvo-truck

And I spent about 100 hours refinishing them. (These doors are in fact a smidge too fancy with reeded details on the panels, but I can live with that.)

IMG_1175

I used trigonometry, the arctangent function, to cut framing lumber for this sloped ceiling in the back bedroom to make the room fit these (definitely not period correct but definitely awesome) closet doors.

IMG_1245

I carried these home when I had literally no use for them just because the idea of them going in the trash upset me. They got passed around to 3 different people but have hopefully now found their forever home. Important: the parallelogram panels in between the triangles were originally glass.

IMG_3435

And when the renovation got me stressed out, I laid out my door hardware and looked at it just to cheer myself up.

P1040240

So, old doors get an emotional reaction out of me. And actually so do the hollow core doors I started with.

P1040175

But a mahogany door in a not quite historically accurate Victorian style? Meh. But I’ve already put money into things that revolve around keeping it, and I still can’t afford to back out of that and dump more money into something else. The Irishman built nice jamb extensions and casings on the inside and when I needed a new lock I went one from Baldwin, the closest approximation I could find of the mortise locks I covet with the modern tubular design.

img_0548

For perspective, the oldest doors on my block or the next, which has identical houses, appear to be from the 1930’s.

IMG_1379.JPG

And there are others behind storm doors that look more like this wider door on a wider house. Note the starburst cut into the glass.

IMG_1390.JPG

Meanwhile, the fanciest houses in the neighborhood seem to hold onto their original doors more often.

IMG_1381.JPG

Even this weird effort to suburbanize a brownstone makes one side of me almost happy. Yes, I’m a fan of that mid-mod/colonial hybrid door if not the rest of what’s going on here.

IMG_1387.JPG

So, I’m not counting on ever looking at my door and being in awe of it.

IMG_1384.JPG

But can we drag its appearance a little closer to the doors I really love?

IMG_1389.JPG

Because when I take a second look at it, I realize that what I like least about this door is the faux-Victorian glass.

img_0542

So, like I said, I’m taking the door off to refinish it. And I’m thinking about my options here. What do you think? I’ll post some ideas next time but maybe yours are better than mine. For now, let’s just say that I have mixed feelings about clear glass.

 

No Responses

  1. Casey says:

    The faux-victorian glass does kind of fight the look you’ve worked so hard to create. Maybe a plain, beveled piece would work better?

  2. Ross says:

    There is NO question of what to do.

    GET RID OF THE UGLY 1980s DOOR!

    It is an insult to the house and all your work.

    I would scour the neighborhood to find an original door on a comparable house, and then haunt salvage yards for something similar.

    GET RID OF THE UGLY 1980s DOOR!

  3. Jo says:

    I’m not wild about the faux Victorian glass either. I’m sure you’ll come up with something exciting. Jo @ Let’s Face the Music

  4. Mary Elizabeth says:

    Am not at all wild about this door, but when I began to imagine it refinished and with plain glass I could see how you could live with it while you execute a search for the perfect entry door. That could take years. You could put one of those door window curtain panels behind the glass to create some interest and let in light while retaining privacy. By the way, Country Curtains is going out of business, so everything is on sale.
    https://www.countrycurtains.com/product/01091592+striped+semi-sheer+door+panel.do?sortby=ourPicks&refType=&from=Search&ecList=6&ecCategory=

  5. Until you find the perfect (antique) door to install, you might consider toning this door down with paint (yes, paint it!) and replacing the leaded glass panel with a textured or frosted glass panel.
    Some kind of glass with a bit of personality like this:
    https://www.delphiglass.com/stained-glass/clear-textured-glass/clear-tapestry
    Such a move would make the door less abraisive and buy you some time.

    • Funny, the fact that the door is mahogany is the one thing that I do like about it! That glass isn’t sold in sheets big enough to use for this door. Also, I have an update coming.

    • And (spoilers!) don’t you think this door’s resale value will be better if I leave the door unpainted and with the leaded glass?

      • Like anything else, “value” depends upon the audience. A purist fan of 19th-century architecture would not see much value in the door while someone restoring a 1980’s McMansion would pay a premium for it.

      • True; the door is more petit than the proportions favored in McMansions, but the style is more late 20th-century than early 20th-century. Aesthetically, it just doesn’t relate to your particular house. Many front doors don’t – I cringe every time I see a 1950’s ranch house with some neo-Victorian door featuring a giant oval leaded glass panel with matching sidelights or an Italianate house with a neo-Craftsman door stuck on it. Architecture generally looks best when all of the components are relaying the same message, otherwise known as “architectural integrity”. It’s not about whether the door is nice or not; it’s about whether or not it stylistically is an appropriate fit for its context. Anything you do to the door will be an improvement so that you will be happier with it until you find your “forever door”!

      • The house in Delaware County is impressive… most of the Arts and Crafts makeover was confined to the exterior and it was done very well. A bit of the influence creeps inside at the fireplace surrounds, but it is very restrained. Who would have thought that this aesthetic could be merged so pleasantly with Greek Revival?! Not everyone can blend such divergent styles so smoothly… this is the exception and unfortunately not the rule. Thanks for sharing!

  6. If you replace the glass, I’d be happy to take the leaded piece to help you out. 🙃 I understand your dislike of the door. I don’t like ours either.

    • Well I have an update to this post now. And yeah, an understated colonial style door would suit your house better. I felt like the condition of my door forced my hand or I’d be living with it too

  7. khend519 says:

    How do you feel about painting it a statement color? I love a good, eye-popping statement door, and I think your existing door would look lovely with a laquer (even just a glossy black), with all that detail. If you’re dead set on stain, then ya, I’d probably find something more appropriate from a salvage.

Leave a Reply